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South Valley Riverton Journal

Parent wants ADHD to receive more focused attention from educators

Feb 03, 2025 01:50PM ● By Jet Burnham

ADHD coach Raquel Gonçalves Lubbers presents information about ADHD to the staff of a Daybreak Elementary to help them better understand and help their students. (Photo courtesy Raquel Gonçalves Lubbers)

Teachers are seeing an increase in numbers of students with ADHD, which affects their academic, social and emotional development. Some said one-third to almost half of the students in their classroom have ADHD. The diagnosis means their brains are wired differently, and it is challenging for them to complete tasks, stay focused, remember the steps they’ve learned and to control their impulses and emotional responses.


Deficit of understanding

ADHD behaviors require alternatives to traditional teaching and discipline methods, said Raquel Gonçalves Lubbers. When she was teaching, she didn’t understand how her students with ADHD brains’ processed information. Years later, when she, her husband and all of their children were diagnosed with ADHD, she became an expert in order to understand how to work through their struggles. She was shocked when she tended to know more about the subject than the mental health professionals she met with. She was also surprised to discover school teachers don’t receive any explicit training on ADHD.

 “In school, they would tell us about some things we might see, some disabilities, learning disabilities, things like that, but as far as what to do about them, how to help those kids? — I didn’t get specific training,” third grade teacher Joy Edman said.

Eventually, Lubbers created a website of resources (adhdheroacademy.com) and became a certified ADHD coach to help people understand and manage their ADHD. She serves on the board for the newly organized Utah ADHD Collective and also hopes to start an ADHD podcast. She is offering a free webinar Feb. 27 at 6:30 p.m.


The impact of ignorance

Lubbers’ concern is that failing to address ADHD appropriately can be damaging to kids.

“These kids are underperforming because they need support, and they don’t even know they need support,” Lubbers said. “They just assume that they’re a terrible person, and so does everyone else, because everyone’s told them their whole lives, ‘You could be so much better if you just tried. Why don’t you care?’— all the language of failure, blame and shame.” 

Research shows people with ADHD have higher rates of suicide, anxiety, depression and school dropouts, Lubbers said.

 “It is shocking, isn’t it, that there isn’t more specific training to help this portion of the population that have really dire consequences because they aren’t getting the support that they need,” she said.

 Lubbers developed a training presentation specifically for educators to help them understand the reasons behind the behavior exhibited from students with ADHD. She has reached out to school administrators and district representatives to advocate for more training, more understanding, more supports and more resources for both students and their teachers.

By educating parents and teachers, Lubbers hopes that attitudes toward ADHD will improve and kids will get the support they need.

Lubbers said many secondary school teachers don’t realize kids with ADHD can have as much as a 30% delay in the executive functioning skills needed to work independently. 

“As executive functions go in their brain, they’re still in elementary school, but no one’s supporting it because they assume they should know this by now,” Lubbers said.


ADHD solutions in the classroom

Lubbers presented her training to the staff at Daybreak Elementary School and wishes more educators would prioritize ADHD-specific training.

“I recognize that the initial gut reaction of admins and teachers is probably ‘I can’t even do one more thing,’” she said. “They don’t realize that this ‘one more thing’ actually helps them in everything. It helps themselves and it helps put them into a position to make tiny little changes that make everything easier in the classroom.”

Because she didn’t receive any specific training on ADHD, Edman said when she first began teaching, she struggled to understand her students with ADHD.

“As I’ve gotten to know the kids better, I realize that they legitimately think about things differently,” she said.

The strategies she now uses in her classroom to help these students were learned through experience and experimentation.

“It’s a lot of ‘Let’s try it and see if this works,’” she said. “And you’ve got to persevere through that hard time where it’s not working and not give up too early on something.”

Some of her students with ADHD are motivated by reward charts, especially when they are themed according to their interests. Others need a visual checklist to help them stay organized and on-task. Edman said many of the strategies she uses to help students with attention deficits and executive functioning struggles—repeating directions multiple times, having kids repeat instructions, using visual reminders and timers—are simply best practices for teachers.

 Some of the strategies fifth grade teacher Angelique Boyles has found to be effective are allowing students to take frequent breaks and using games and challenges to stimulate and motivate them.

“ADHD is such a grab bag of symptoms,” Boyles said. “It shows up in so many different ways and so many different combinations that what works for one kid doesn’t always work for the others. But there are definitely ones that usually work so I try those first.”

Boyles actively follows ADHD experts on social media, reads books and listens to podcasts to continually learn new strategies.

“I’m always looking for something—what do I not know? What else can I try? What else can I put in my toolbox to try for these kids?” she said.

Boyles didn’t understand how ADHD was impacting her students until her own child was diagnosed with ADHD.

“Their brains just work differently,” she said. “They’re still good people, they’re very kind, they want to learn and they want to succeed just like anybody else, but their executive functioning skills, that part of their brain, is developing at two-thirds the rate of a normal child.”

Once she understood that, she was able to take a more compassionate approach when ADHD behaviors disrupted her classroom.

“ADHD is something you are born with,” she said. “It’s the way your brain is functioning, and it’s not something that you can train yourself and then you don’t have it anymore. You will always have ADHD. But there are strategies and things that you can do to help minimize those effects.”

  She happily shares what she’s learned with parents or colleagues who ask. Without explicit training, that is how most teachers learn how to help their students with ADHD. In a school full of teachers, there’s always someone who has been through the same situation that you are struggling with now, Edman said.

“I’ve been so lucky to have great teachers around me that I could go to and say, ‘Hey, this is what I’m noticing—what do I do?’” Edman said.


School resources

Each school in Jordan District also has a psychologist who is available as a resource for teachers.

“Our training in mental health and assessment allows us to have that background knowledge, to know how to work with kids that are experiencing ADHD in the classroom,” Fort Herriman Middle School Psychologist Jared Bailey said.

Psychologists can help teachers understand ADHD and they can suggest strategies and resources. They can also work with students individually—at a parent’s request—to help them figure out ways to organize their assignments, manage their impulse control or regulate their emotions, which helps improve students’ behavior in the classroom.


Accommodations for ADHD

Students with ADHD symptoms severe enough to interfere with their ability to access learning can qualify for accommodations through a Section 504 plan. In Jordan District, 2,683 students (4.75% of all students) have a 504 plan to address ADHD, diabetes or other disabilities.

Jordan District 504 Teacher Specialist Glenn Williams explains, “A 504 plan is about identifying what problems the disability is causing for the student in terms of barriers to participating and then taking those barriers out of the way so that they can participate like everybody else. We’re not intending to fix those problems; we’re intending to remove those problems from the equation, in a sense, so that the student has a level playing field, or just has an equal opportunity to succeed.”

Accommodations for students with ADHD commonly include being allowed to take frequent movement breaks, getting an extension on due dates, having teachers repeat or give written instructions, establishing a signal teachers can use to subtly direct the student’s attention back to their task or having teachers check in with the student periodically to keep them on task.

Because the effects of ADHD vary depending on the type and the student, 504 plan accommodations are individualized, based on what specific challenges a student experiences. However, not every student with an ADHD diagnosis qualifies for a 504, and not all proposed accommodations are possible.

Ideally, Bailey said, students, parents, psychologists and teachers work together to determine the best accommodations.

“I think it takes everyone to help that child feel supported, and to look for ways that they can help them,” he said.

He said it’s helpful for secondary teachers especially to be involved so that they understand that the cause of the students’ behaviors is due to a difference in processing and development, not a defiant attitude.


Resources for families

Jordan District provides additional resources for parents and students with ADHD through the Jordan District Family Education Center, where the lending library has over 1,000 books covering a variety of topics including ADHD.

Classes offered at the Family Education Center can also help address behaviors associated with ADHD. There is a class specifically for parenting children with ADHD, but Bailey said other classes such as those that address anger management, anxiety, depression, self-esteem, social skills and mindfulness can also be beneficial.

Families can also utilize the Family Education Center’s free, short-term counseling services to get an ADHD diagnosis or to learn strategies and skills to reduce their challenges.

If parents suspect their child has ADHD, they can reach out to their child’s doctor or a school psychologist for an evaluation. While some parents are reluctant to label their kids because of a negative stigma or misunderstanding of ADHD, many experts say that without a diagnosis to explain their behaviors and struggles, a child is left exposed to inaccurate and hurtful labels such as “troublemaker,” “lazy” and “rude.” λ